Shiv Sena joins opposition chorus, attacks BJP

The House was adjourned once over the issue before it was adjourned for the day, just 40 minutes into the day’s proceedings.

mumbaiUpdated: Mar 06, 2018 00:32 IST

HT Correspondent

Hindustan Times

The House was adjourned once over the issue before it was adjourned for the day, just 40 minutes into the day’s proceedings.(Anshuman Poyrekar/HT Photo)

The Maharashtra legislative council on Monday witnessed a ruckus over the suspension of Bharatiya Janata Party-backed legislator Prashant Paricharak.

Last week, the council had revoked the suspension of Paricharak, who had allegedly made derogatory comments about wives of Armymen in March 2017.

The House was adjourned once over the issue before it was adjourned for the day, just 40 minutes into the day’s proceedings.

Following the revoking of the suspension, the Shiv Sena took an aggressive stand over the issue. Sena legislator and party’s group leader in the Council, Anil Parab said the proposal to revoke Paricharak’s suspension was approved amid a din last week. “Today I am moving a proposal for permanent termination of the membership of the legislator,” he said.

Paricharak, who was suspended for 1.5 years in March 2017, had joked during an election campaign that soldiers posted at the borders distribute sweets on the birth of their babies, although they have not gone home in a year, indirectly implying that their wives are unfaithful.

The Opposition, meanwhile, demanded the government should once again clear its stand on Paricharak’s statements. “Revoking the suspension and allowing Paricharak in the House would set a wrong precedent,” said Janata Dal (U) legislator Kapil Patil. “…the language used by him (Paricharak), are the views and ideology of the ones who are in power in the country, and hence this issue becomes a serious one.”

State revenue minister Chandrakant Patil said, “I am telling you at the beginning itself there is no need to link the issue with the ideology, repeatedly. Last time also this had happened; there is no need to say such things in the House. What is going on?”

Meanwhile, Sena legislator Neelam Gorhe, who was on the 10-member committee to probe the incident, said the decision to revoke the suspension of Paricharak was not unanimous as told to the House by Chandrakant Patil. “I cannot discuss the details of the committee in the House, but there was no consensus,” Gorhe said.

Shiv Sena urges CM to come clear on Konkan refinery project

Mumbai Shiv Sena leader and industries minister Subhash Desai urged the chief minister Devendra Fadnavis to clarify the government stand on the proposed refinery project at Ratnagiri, on the backdrop of opposition from locals and landowners. The minister made a statement after his party faced embarrassment on the written reply in the lower house last week in which his own department had stated that there was no opposition to the project.

In his statement in the legislative assembly on Monday, Desai said nine gram panchayats governing the 14 villages to be rehabilitated due to the project have passed the resolution opposing the project. He said that amid the resistance from the villagers, the acquisition is going to be difficult under Maharashtra Land Acquisition Act 2013.

“Even during his meeting with the CM, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray had handed over the letters of resistance signed by thousands of farmers to him. The CM had clarified that the government will have a dialogue with the locals before taking any decision and the project will not be imposed upon the locals,” Desai said.

CM Fadnavis had said in December that there was competition between two Sena MPs Anant Gite (Raigad) and Vinayak Raut (Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg) to take the project to their respective constituencies. Both the MPs denied the claim and clarified that the party was against the project as it will ruin ecology in the coastal districts.

Nationalist Congress Part y leader Jayant Patil took a dig at government for the differences within it over the project. “In my parliamentary life of 28 years, it was for the first time I saw a minister in his statement urging the CM to take a call,” he said.